I don't think I ever read a romance set in the Academia world and this was the perfect one to start with. The love Hypothesis is very immersive but stays true to romance in the best possible way - the from com way. going on my confirmed rom-com shelf!

What I liked: Olive was totally a cutie, relating very much to her as one of the very few numbered girl students in my engineering classes back in the day. (Not a scientist but the field and the apprehensions are so similar). Fell immediately in love with Anh, too. As a fiction, I gobbled up the meet-cute (I know, not irl maybe but if I have Adam to end up with, who knows ;-) ) , I LOVEEED the references to romance tropes especially the one when Olive is going on about the one bed and Adam is like a confused cassette, "what? but there are two." The whole book has multiples of these and I'd read just for them alone.
Olive is an unsure but intelligent girl, who is driven by her research project but also and this is the winning line - her friends' absolute happiness. She fake-dates so her friend can date her ex guild-free. awwww moment.

And Adam. all right, I totally got a highlander vibe but that's the historical romance lover in me I suppose :-D Let me just say, I am so looking forward to that chapter Ali Hazelwood is teasing about from Adam's POV. GIVE IT TO ME!

I'd say a must read.
P.S. : you can not stop once you start so slot your reading on a day you can afford not to answer your door and phone.

What I didn't like: Pumpkin spice praise LOL. I hate it with equal fervor and I would high-five Adam for this.

CW: None from my angle, references to sexual harassment at work place(but nothing happens) if for some it could be a trigger.

This fake dating romance set in the world of academia was a cute, funny and satisfying quick read. Olive is a PhD student who finds herself fake dating Adam, a Stanford professor, in order to convince her best friend that she’s over her ex. Their fake dating adventure is made all the more enjoyable due to endearing lovable characters, snappy dialogue, witty banter and lots of chemistry. Although this story has many tropes, it is done really well and they come together nicely. Highly recommend this smart, fun and sexy contemporary romance.
Thanks to NetGalley for providing an Arc of this story in exchange for an honest review.

I have a few things to say about this book but, I will attempt to keep it brief. The character development, the plot, the writing is so good and made it so easy to read! Adam is the most fabulous love interest and I am extremelu angry he isn't real.

Minhas expectativas para essa leitura estavam lá em cima e eu não poderia estar mais feliz que estava certíssima!

Olive é uma estudante de PHD em Stanford. E como qualquer outra estudante de PHD sua vida gira em torno da ciência, muitas horas no laboratório, viver com um salário baixo e poucas horas com seus melhores amigos. E é em uma dessas noites que fugindo da amiga, Anh, que ela resolve beijar um estranho no corredor. Acontece que Olive mentiu para a amiga ao dizer que ia para um encontro, pois ela percebeu que Anh estava interessada em Jeremy, seu ex. Então nada mais lógico que ao ser pega no laboratório ao invés de num encontro, ela beijar um estranho no corredor e convencer Anh que já superou o ex. Acontece que o estranho era ninguém menos que Adam Carlsen, o professor mais temido do campus. Totalmente pega numa teia de mentiras Olive propõe a Adam que eles finjam estar namorando e ele aceita, já que o namoro vai mostrar ao comitê da Universidade que ele não pretende ir a lugar algum. Acontece que quanto mais tempo os dois passam juntos, mais o relacionamento parece real.

Primeiro preciso dizer que não é todo dia que você se depara com um livro que traz uma mulher cientista! Como cientista eu tô maravilhada e mais feliz ainda por ver que a autora foi além do romance ao trazer questões importantes como o assédio na academia e a importância das mulheres na ciência.

Olive pegou uma experiência pessoal e transformou isso em ciência e eu posso dizer por experiência que cientistas assim são simplesmente os melhores! Foi muito fácil para mim a identificação com essa personagem, horas dentro de uma Universidade, a insegurança acerca de sua pesquisa e todos os problemas de financiamento são muito familiares para mim, talvez em um nível até mais profundo já que a personagem estudava em uma das melhores Universidades do mundo enquanto eu estudo no Brasil desse péssimo presidente que além de desprezar a ciência está acabando com nossas pesquisas.

Adam, por sua vez, é um personagem que eu amei acompanhar. E sim, tudo que ele diz sobre pesquisa e a seriedade com que orientadores devem criticar as pesquisas de estudantes é real, assim como o que ele passou com o orientador dele. São situações tão comuns na academia que tornam o ambiente acadêmico um dos mais tóxicos para se trabalhar.

A relação dos dois foi muito bem construída e eu amei demais ver como a Olive conseguia arrancar sorrisos de Adam e como eles foram se tornando tão importantes e especiais na vida um do outro.

Minha única ressalva com esse livro vem da relação de Olive com Anh e Malcom, seus melhores amigos. Na maioria das vezes parece uma relação unilateral. Enquanto Olive faz tudo para que a amiga fique com seu ex, Anh simplesmente troca a amiga pelo macho assim que pode. Do mesmo jeito aconteceu com Malcom, ele sabia que o relacionamento era falso e mesmo assim deixou a Olive sozinha. Dois péssimos amigos que não merecem esse cristal.

Fora essa pequena ressalva eu tenho a dizer que o livro vale muito a pena! E o melhor é que ele será lançado ano que vem no Brasil pela Editora Arqueiro!

I loved this book. My friend asked me to tell her if she should read it when I was done but after the third chapter, I told her to go ahead and buy it because it had already become one of my favorite books. The Love Hypothesis was entertaining, adorable, and just perfect. I stayed up until 2:30 to finish it. Do yourself a favor and read this book.

A refreshing plot that sets up in academia. Fake relationship between scientists but romantic gravity won’t let them slide. Character development is so good. I’ve grown to like Adam and Olive. There are both adorable, funny and smart-asses. Though it’s kinda predictable, I still enjoy reading because of Adam’s interesting character.

The Love Hypothesis was amazing and entertaining romance that revolved around Olive a PhD grade student and Adam, a faculty member tangled into fake dating by accidental kiss that turned into something much more dangerous, love. The story was about women in STEM, academia, working in field of men, anxiety, friendship, found family, and love.

Writing was gripping, fun, and fast paced that made smile throughout the book. It was written in third person narrative from Olive’s perspective. Olive’s voice was refreshing and her sunshine personality made the story perfect. I bet this would be amazing audiobook as her voice in my mind and even reading out loud sounded amazing. Plot was interesting and entertaining. A book makes me laugh from the very first chapter rarely happens and it did with this.

It started with prologue, Olive meeting a guy before her interview for PhD with whom she found connection but couldn’t see his face clearly due to her expired contacts and couldn’t get his name as well. Two years later Olive accidentally kissed a man to prove her point to her best friend and that person turned out a professor, Dr Adam Carlsen, who had reputation of destroyer of research career in biology department. (How the hell she wouldn’t know who she was kissing until the kiss ended!? Sounds absurd but very well explained and whole thing made me laugh so much)

Well the kiss wasn’t that believable and she had to dive into fake dating with Adam and Adam surprised her by agreeing to fake date and even supported her in whole charade as he too wanted something out of it. But As they spent more time with each other their harmless fake dating turned into something serious and dangerous that might cost their heart.

It was easy to connect the dots about the guy Olive met before her PhD was Adam but it was interesting to see when Olive would realize that and what they would do when they have to reveal they were fake dating or would they confess their real feelings.

Olive and Adam were perfect but I also enjoyed secondary characters. Olive’s best friends Ahn and Macolm were fantastic. I enjoyed reading how Olive met them and how their friendship grew stronger and became like family she never had. They were so supportive and protective of Olive and I loved them for nudging Olive to right direction, giving right advice, and always making her feel she belonged. I enjoyed reading about Adam’s friends, specially Dr Holden, who was with Adam in all phases of life and it was amazing to read their friendship.

Olive was charm of the book. She was brilliant, smart, fun to be around with sunshine personality that not just made herself glow but also people around her. She was definitely unique and extraordinary but she was oblivious to all those fact. I felt for her reading about her vulnerability, her fears, anxiety, and loneliness. Her story about her mother, why she decided to be in academia, pursue PhD in biology touched my heart. It made me want to hug her and cheer her for her research even more. It was amazing to see how meeting Adam, spending time with him boost her confidence, she found connection at Stanford that she didn’t feel so far and felt safe and secure with him. I liked how she realized she didn’t have to fear and lie about her feelings at the end.

Tall, broody, six packed, handsome with genius IQ but unapproachable, notoriously moody, obnoxious, and antagonistic- perfectly described Adam. His reputations in the beginning and all the gossips around academia about him made him hard to like but I loved him. It was clear there was more to him and as story progressed we understand him even more. He was fiercely loyal, protective, caring, and best professor and mentor. I admired him for not paying attention to rumors and his reputation, strongly believing in helping his grads becoming best scientist even though it hurt their feelings, and not taking advantage of his position. His past, his years as grade student and working under abusive mentor made me feel for him and admire him even more. I loved how being with Olive brought out best in him.

Opposite attracts, age gap, fake dating arc, and forced proximity… this had all amazing tropes. Romance was both cute and steamy. Chemistry between Olive and Adam was perfect. I loved the way their relationship grew and it was pretty fast as well. By middle of the book Olive realized she fell for Adam and still it was great to see her getting over her doubts and fears and how their feelings grew even more in second half.

Banter between characters was my most favorite part and I also loved Olive’s hypothesis in the beginning of each chapter. I loved how honestly author depicted women in STEM, BIPOC characters, hostile and grueling life of academia, what students go through and how competitive their life and personality becomes in academia, what women have to face in field of men and also title IX in U.S.

Twist and turns were good. Some of the things I could see coming, some I failed to see even though hints were there and that surprised me for what happened to Olive in climax. Author handled the situation and Olive’s feeling sensitively and perfectly. I liked everything that happened after Climax and end was so so lovely.

Overall, The Love Hypothesis was fun, refreshing, cute and steamy, and fast paced romance with all amazing trope and main character as a woman in STEM.

I highly recommend this if you love,
Women in STEM
BIPOC character
fake dating
Age gap
forced proximity
sunshine girl /grumpy guy trope
opposite attracts
well written setting and characters
cute and steamy romance

Holy cow this was the nerdy rom com I didn’t know I needed in my life. Bookstagram made me do it and I am soooo glad I did.

So cute! The characters, perfection. The story, perfection. The romance, perfection. EVERYTHING, perfection. READ THIS BOOK!

The pros of this book are that it's set in the STEM field and the writing is pretty decent. I HATED Tom but we're supposed to so the author did a good job there.
The negatives are that it's originally a Reylo fanfic. Adam Driver is one of the least sexy people to me so I was trying to make myself NOT thinking about him. Olive was pretty much a Mary Sue because there was nothing all that descriptive or anything that stood out to me.
Overall it wasn't that bad. It's nice to get STEM representation. The author didn't even refer to any kind of map when talking about Stanford and Palo Alto. She clearly has never been because it's not a hilly area! She also mentions there are no bike lanes and there's a bunch. Haha.
While the love scene was pretty steamy, I didn't love that the protection conversation was kind of glossed over. Adam seemed WAY more aggressive during the the scene than the entire book. It felt out of character just so the author could write a dominating sex scene.
Overall, the writing is decent enough and I appreciated the STEM representation.

***Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review***
I could not put this book down!!! I love getting a peek into the world of STEM and the struggle women have to fit in and this book addresses that issue while also being an absolutely love romance with a fake-dating trope. Wonderful characters with witty banter!

A fun take on a classic trope. I enjoyed that the characters got to be more complex than the stereo-typical romantically awkward fictional scientists. The author actually recognizes that you can be scienc-y and romantic/sexy. The only thing that I felt it lacked was that faked that Adam's declaration was kind of, as one of my grad school professors would say, just plopped. He said it in a way that seemed out of the blue, yet fitting for the the scene/plot, but then it Olive doesn't seem to acknowledge it.

Thank you to Berkley Romance for giving me a chance to read a digital ARC of this book! This book had a lot of hype surrounding it, and it made me really excited to read it and see what the hype was about. Olive is a graduate student and Adam is a professor. Adam has a reputation for being an arrogant jerk, and he is known for making students cry and drop out. Olive gets herself into a bit of a pickle if you will, and she ends up fake dating Adam, also known as Dr. Carlsen. What could possibly go wrong? Overall, I really enjoyed this story. I liked the representation of a female scientist, not just Olive but her friend Anh as well. I also liked how it dealt with issues such as sexual harassment that women deal with in the workplace and other places that are predominantly male. Olive was working towards detecting pancreatic cancer earlier because she lost her mom, which added another dimension to the story. I lost my grandmother to pancreatic cancer thirty days after she was diagnosed, and I understand how quickly it moves and how deadly it is. I feel like Olive was more developed than Adam was; he was a bit vague, even through to the end of the story. I wouldn't mind if some of the secondary characters in this book got a spin off. One thing is for sure- I thought this was a solid debut by Hazelwood, and I am looking forward to reading more of her books in the future.

Rating 5
AHHHH I LOVED THIS BOOK! There I had to get that off my chest. This book had me smiling like a dork from the first chapter. I knew right away I was hooked. Olive and Adam were the cutest fake couple I’ve ever read. I could feel their chemistry from their first awkward kiss to their sweet real kisses. I instantly became obsessed with this story and would use any opportunity I had to read. My problem was I loved this book so much I didn’t want it to be over but I wanted it to be over so I knew what happened. Now that I’ve finished reading I immediately want to reread it. How I felt when reading this book is exactly how I wish others felt when reading. It’s a feeling that can’t quite be described instead just personally felt. One knows when they are having that ‘special’ feeling with a book.
The author did a great j0b of pacing the story and having a good amount of build up. Both characters developed actual feelings and not just feelings of attraction. One could tell that Olive and Adam actually felt for one another on a deeper level. Adam would have done anything for Olive especially when she was sad. Olive would have changed her life plans if it meant that Adam could live the life she thought he wanted. This is what I adored. Two characters that understood each other even if their peers didn’t understand them at all. The side characters were great additions to the story. They weren’t plain at all but instead had their own unique personalities. There are only two characters in this story I hated and wish I could slap! Sadly, due to spoilers I can’t tell you who but I’m sure when reading you will know!

I recommend this book to anyone who wants to have a romance that will make them swoon. That will make them laugh out loud one minute then crying the next.

The Love Hypothesis is a wonderful romance. The progression of the story is natural, the banter and interactions genuine, and overall a smart romantic read. This is definitely a reread for me. In fact, I read it the first time, hugged it for a few minutes then read it again. I'm recommending this one to all our romance readers at the library and even a few who are purely dedicated to realistic fiction.

This was such a fun and cute read that was sharp, witty and full of combustible tension! I throughly enjoyed the chemistry that Olive and Adam had and I always relish in a good fake relationship trope! The banter between the two was also incredibly entertaining!

Hazelwood did a great job making these characters feel so relatable and Olives geeky and quirky persona was just so endearing! I also applaud her for creating such a great diverse cast.

This is the perfect RomCom is you’re looking for a fun escape!

This was an okay but cute Rom-com for me. I liked the banter between the two main characters, but found it very predictable.

Ali Hazelwood's THE LOVE HYPOTHESIS is everything I wanted and more. It has gone right to the top of my fake-dating list as well as my grumpy/sunshine list.. While I feel the first few chapters were a bit cheesy, these characters found their way into my heart very quickly and aren't going anywhere. I keep refreshing the internet waiting for a second book announcement. I'm a fan of Hazelwood's for life!

I can't say that I loved it. I needed more romance, I needed more Olive and Adam interactions. I felt like we talked more about Olive's standing as a Ph.D. candidate and how academia demands a lot from you and the output can often be disappointing. The book also does a good job at displaying the toxicity of academia rather than romanticizing it but I came with the expectations of fake dating shenanigans and more.

Thanks to the publisher for an eARC in exchange for my honest review.

So so cute!! This book 100% deserves all the hype that I've seen everywhere and now I understand why! I loved the banter and quality humour between the characters. It's definitely a classic high quality rom-com that I will be recommending to everyone!